Paul de Jong and Nick Zammuto (otherwise known as the Books) started working together in 2000 while living as neighbors in Inwood, a small neighborhood at the very northern tip of Manhattan, regularly referred to as 'Upstate Manhattan' by New Yorkers. Over the next few years they moved around a lot but always kept the music going through the mail, and occasional recording sessions. Since 2002 they've settled their working studio in the Berkshire Mountains of North Adams, Massachusetts. They do all of their own sample collecting, composing, writing, recording, mixing, and mastering in their home studios using PCs running cheap software and the ragtag equipment that they've pieced together over the years. What you hear on their records is exactly how it left their hands, with no producer, engineers, or sweetening in between.